SULPHURETTED HYDROGEN IN BRACKISH LAGOONS, ETC. 689 



If sterilised sea water be inoculated with these bacteria, sul- 

 phuretted hydrogen may be given off in small quantities, but when 

 organic matter or a salt of ammonia is added to the sea water much 

 ^greater amounts of sulphuretted hydrogen are given off. This 

 evolution of sulphuretted hydrogen may continue until the whole 

 of the sulphates in the sea water has disappeared. 



Should the soakage waters or streams entering the brackish 

 creeks or lagoons contain flocculi of oxide of iron, then sulphide 

 of iron is formed with the sulphuretted hydrogen set free by the 

 bacterial action. The sulphide of iron settles into the mud at the 

 bottom of the creek or lagoon and the accumulation of such sulphide 

 of iron in the mud produces the black colour which is so frequently 

 found in the muds in these creeks and lagoons. 



6.— SCHOOL ANTHROPOMETRICS : THE IMPORTANCE OF AUS- 

 TRALASIAN MEASUREMENTS CONFORMING TO THE 

 SCHEDULE OF THE BRITISH ANTHROPOMETRIC 

 COMMITTEE, 1908. 



By Dr. MARY BOOTH, B.A., M.S., CM. {Edin.). 



Anthropometry has for its object the exact measurement of the 

 anatomical, physiological and psychological characters of man ; for 

 •example, his height and weight, eye and hair colours, vision and 

 hearing, and mental attributes such as attention and memory. It 

 takes into count the facts of liis heredity and the kind and the 

 quality of the factors of his environment ; for example, race, food, 

 clothing, climate, sleep, duration and time of work. It is the 

 physical basis of the enquiry as to whether heredity or environment 

 is the more potent influence in his mental and physical development 

 —that is the determination of the relation of man to liis environ- 

 ment and of the laws of human evolution. The scientist values the 

 enquiry as advancing his knowledge of man. The social economist 

 is beginning to appreciate it for certain practical advantages which 

 he anticipates to the race ; to liim the collection of anthropometric 

 data means a stock-taking of the physical fitness of the nation and 

 an estimate of the heredity and environmental factors at work on 

 the whole or sections of society. 



Anthropometry had its beginning in the measurement of the 

 proportions of the human body for the purposes of art. In the 

 ancient civihsations of Egypt and Greece certain ideal standards 

 of physical beauty were formulated. Down to the 16th and 17th 

 centuries of the Christian era it still held the artist. He measured 

 that he might portray with truth — and, by the way, added con- 

 siderably to the exact knowledge of man — e.g., the measurements 

 of the facial line and angle. The greatest amount of work at this 

 period, however, was done in anthropology and the scientific study 

 of man. The student was engaged, as one has said of him, digging 

 in the scrap heaps of the past to unravel his racial origin. Later 



